I’m preaching to the choir.
We are all in pain.
We are broken by the inhumanity on blatant display.
We are sickened and crushed by the existence of Trump’s detainment camps.
It’s hard to imagine how we care going to overcome this time in history. How we are going to make good again? How we are going to genuinely care for one another?
Bearing witness to these atrocities is so painful.
I feel paralyzed by the pain.
I feel limited in my capacity to make things better.
I know we need to keep making calls, keep protesting, keep standing up for each other, for those who are being marginalized.
I know I need to show up as a loving person in all my interactions. Patient, gentle and assuming the best of people.
I sit here today, struggling to work, as I try to understand why we ‘other’ people. Why we judge? Why we discriminate? Why we say mean things? Why we turn a blind eye to those suffering? Why we cause suffering?
I don’t understand how people think it’s okay to tear families apart who are crossing the border looking for a safer and better life.
I don’t understand judging people by the color of their skin. I’ll never understand this. It’s outside of my scope.
I don’t understand 'othering' on the macro level and yet, I embody it on a micro level.
I want to rage at every person who voted for these monsters. I remember every friend on Facebook who said Hillary and Trump were the same. Every friend who spread fake news about the "evil" Hillary Clinton. I can name names. I loathe my friend’s parents who voted for Trump. I want to get in their faces and shame them endlessly, to make them feel our pain. I want to them to feel disgraced.
And, with that, I am the problem.
I crave aggression towards those who support Trump, those believe The Fox News lies, who chose Trump for a tax break or because he'd blow up the system without regard for those who would be hurt by it.
I want them all to suffer.
I am so angry. I am so sad. I am devastated.
And I don’t know what to do. Compassion has left me. I know hate begets hate and love begets love and what do we do when human lives are at stake? Do we go to war with our weapons and obliterate them? Or are we Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., the Dalai Lama?
Where is the line?
How can we make things better?
Do I go high or I do I go low? I just don't know.
All I know is that if we keep showing up, we keep speaking out, we stay involved and never stop, we will overcome. History has proven this true.
TODAY’S EASY ACTIVISM from Washington State Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal.
- Take action: Mobilize on June 30 at 11 a.m. at Lafayette Square, Washington, D.C. There will be protests around the country. Find one here - https://www.familiesbelongtogether.org/
- Support the Congresswoman’s legislation – the Dignity for Detained Immigrants Act and the Detention Oversight Not Expansion (DONE) Act – to completely overhaul our immigrant detention system with strengthened oversight and human rights standards, and to prevent the detention of vulnerable populations, including primary caregivers and asylum seekers. We need more co-sponsors for these critical pieces of legislation.
- Support the legal and humanitarian efforts of organizations like the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, Kids in Need of Defense, RAICES, ProBar, and the Texas Civil Rights Project that are on the ground helping the kids and parents impacted by this policy.
And because we can and rage begets rage, feel free to call or text Stephen Miller at 202-881-8641. He’s real busy ruining people's lives so he may not answer or respond.
With gratitude and love -
:: Genessa